Sam McLawhorn, president of the Allen Pearson Emergency Services Foundation, stands in front of the field where the first pitch will be thrown at Bill Fay Park on Friday.

Janet S. Cater / The Free Press

By Jessika Morgan

Published: Tuesday, October 2, 2012 at 08:59 PM.

For the past three years, people have gathered at Bill Fay Park for something more than a grand softball tournament. Players divide into teams, spectators mingle with each other in the stands, and children play games and eat candy as they watch their parents take home base.

When the overstuffed parking lot begins to vacate, people wave to friends, both old and new, bidding to meet again next year. But through that relaxing weekend of swinging for the fences and cracking jokes, one man lives on through the community’s bliss: his name is Allen Pearson.

When Pearson was fatally shot by a fleeing suspect in April 2009, N.C. Highway Patrol trooper Sam McLawhorn built a non-profit organization in honor of the detective he’d seen grow up from age 13.

The Allen Pearson Emergency Services Foundation is supported and funded by the
Lenoir
County
community, raising the most funds during an annual softball tournament.

It’s that time of year again.

Banners and décor go up early Friday morning for the three-day tournament that begins at
6 p.m.
The tournament is apparently growing each year; some 11 teams could not be accommodated at Bill Fay Park’s three diamonds. Twenty-four teams will play wearing No. 105, Pearson’s call number, on their jerseys.

“It’s great. I love it, I really do,” said McLawhorn, the president of APESF. The bigger it gets, “you have more support from the community, and you’re able to provide more for the community.”

For the past three years, people have gathered at Bill Fay Park for something more than a grand softball tournament. Players divide into teams, spectators mingle with each other in the stands, and children play games and eat candy as they watch their parents take home base.

When the overstuffed parking lot begins to vacate, people wave to friends, both old and new, bidding to meet again next year. But through that relaxing weekend of swinging for the fences and cracking jokes, one man lives on through the community’s bliss: his name is Allen Pearson.

When Pearson was fatally shot by a fleeing suspect in April 2009, N.C. Highway Patrol trooper Sam McLawhorn built a non-profit organization in honor of the detective he’d seen grow up from age 13.

The Allen Pearson Emergency Services Foundation is supported and funded by the LenoirCounty community, raising the most funds during an annual softball tournament.

It’s that time of year again.

Banners and décor go up early Friday morning for the three-day tournament that begins at 6 p.m. The tournament is apparently growing each year; some 11 teams could not be accommodated at Bill Fay Park’s three diamonds. Twenty-four teams will play wearing No. 105, Pearson’s call number, on their jerseys.

“It’s great. I love it, I really do,” said McLawhorn, the president of APESF. The bigger it gets, “you have more support from the community, and you’re able to provide more for the community.”

The tournament is set to attract up to 3,000 people, with a team traveling from as far north as Pennsylvania. For the first time, an all-women’s team will compete for the championship trophy. McLawhorn said nearly every county in North Carolina will be represented in the tournament.

While the annual game is probably one of the biggest non-sanctioned softball tournaments in Eastern North Carolina, “All the money is being raised right here” in LenoirCounty, according to McLawhorn.

The foundation, McLawhorn said, is about honoring Pearson as well as showing the community that there are people who care.

“The community should be honored that someone would lay their life on the line like he did,” McLawhorn said. Pearson was the first in the county’s history to be killed during service.

But if you visit the foundation’s website, you see more celebration than grief in the photos of Pearson’s family.

“It helps them cope,” said McLawhorn earnestly. “In my opinion, it keeps them alive and it’s their way of getting through it.”

Pearson’s wife, sister and mother have all thrown the ceremonial first pitch that kicks off the tournament each year. This year it will be his father, Rickie Pearson.

The late Pearson didn’t have children and was the only officer in the barricade that night who didn’t. Pearson worked with kids in the classroom and in sports as a budding T-ball coach.

McLawhorn believes he’d be involved with the youth while being in a supervisory position in law enforcement. Words failed him as he thought of all the possibilities Pearson’s life promised.

The foundation, he said, “not only keeps Allen alive,” but provides assistance and equipment to emergency services. It could be a computer for a patrol car or money for medical bills for a deputy’s daughter. Sometimes assistance is requested.

APESF has raised about $12-13,000 each year, averaging $10,000 from the softball tournament alone. McLawhorn hopes to hit close to $15,000 this weekend. Even if the financial goal isn’t reached, there’s one thing that will be guaranteed: “Knowing that everyone thinks about him at least one weekend a year,” said McLawhorn.